As a surviving spouse in Connecticut, you have rights to a share of your late spouse’s estate, protection against being disinherited by a will, financial support and continued occupancy of the family home during probate, certain household property shielded from creditors, automatic beneficiary status on most employer retirement plans, Social Security survivor benefits, and important tax elections. Many of these Connecticut surviving spouse rights are not automatic. You have to file for them, and several deadlines are short.
Your Share If There Is No Will
When a Connecticut resident dies without a valid will, intestacy law decides who gets what. Your share as the surviving spouse depends on who else is alive.
- No children and no surviving parents of your spouse: you inherit the entire estate.
- Children who are also your children: you receive the first $100,000 plus half of the remaining estate. The children split the rest.
- Children from your spouse’s prior relationship: you receive half the estate. The other half goes to those children. The $100,000 preferential share does not apply.
- No children, but one or both of your spouse’s parents survive: you receive the first $100,000 plus three-quarters of the balance. The parents receive the rest.1Justia. Connecticut Code Title 45a-437 – Intestate Succession, Distribution to Spouse
The stepchildren scenario catches people off guard. If your spouse had children from a previous relationship, half the probate estate goes directly to them, and the $100,000 off-the-top share disappears.
If the Will Leaves You Out or Leaves You Very Little
Connecticut’s elective share stops a spouse from cutting you out entirely, but it works differently than most people expect. Rather than giving you outright ownership of part of the estate, it gives you a life-use interest in one-third of the probate estate. You are entitled to the income those assets generate for the rest of your life. You do not own or control the underlying property.2Justia. Connecticut Code Title 45a-436 – Succession Upon Death of Spouse
The deadline is tight. You must file in probate court within 150 days after the estate’s administrator is appointed, or within 60 days after the will is admitted to probate, whichever comes later. Courts do not extend this deadline simply because you did not know about it.2Justia. Connecticut Code Title 45a-436 – Succession Upon Death of Spouse
The election has one significant limit. It only reaches the probate estate. Assets held in revocable trusts, jointly titled accounts, life insurance payable to a named beneficiary, and retirement accounts with beneficiary designations are all outside it. If your spouse routed most of their wealth around probate, your one-third life use may attach to a small pool.
If the Will Was Written Before You Married
If your spouse wrote a will before your marriage and never updated it, Connecticut treats you as a pretermitted spouse. You receive the same share you would have received under intestacy, as if there were no will at all. This protection disappears only if the will itself shows your spouse deliberately excluded a future spouse, or if your spouse provided for you outside the will through a trust, life insurance, or similar arrangement.3Justia. Connecticut Code Title 45a-257a – Failure of Testator to Provide for Surviving Spouse
This comes up often in second marriages where an older estate plan was never revised.
Money and Housing While the Estate Is Settled
Probate can take months. Connecticut probate courts can order a family allowance from estate assets to cover necessary living expenses during that time. The allowance takes priority over most creditor claims, so it is paid before unsecured debts. The court can order a lump sum or periodic payments, and the allowance can continue for the entire settlement period. The court may also let you keep using your spouse’s car if it was maintained as a family vehicle. There is no fixed statutory cap. The court weighs the estate’s size, your needs, and the standard of living you and your spouse had.4Justia. Connecticut Code Title 45a-320 – Allowance for Support of Surviving Spouse and Family
Separately, Connecticut exempts certain property from creditor claims entirely. You can keep household furniture, appliances, bedding, food, and personal effects, and up to two motor vehicles with a combined fair market value of $7,000 after subtracting loans or liens.5Justia. Connecticut Code Title 52-352b – Exempt Property
You also have the right to stay in the home. The probate court can allow the family to remain in the dwelling your spouse occupied at the time of death until it is sold, distributed, or otherwise dealt with in the estate settlement.6Justia. Connecticut Code Title 45a-321 – Custody of Real Property, Family May Occupy Homestead
How the home was titled changes what happens next. If it was held as joint tenants with rights of survivorship, ownership transfers to you automatically outside probate. All you need to do is record the death certificate with the land records. If it was held as tenants in common, only your spouse’s share enters probate, and you could end up co-owning the house with other heirs or facing a court-ordered sale.7Justia. Connecticut Code Title 47-14a – Joint Tenancy in Fee Simple With Survivorship
If Your Spouse Received Medicaid
If your spouse received Medicaid, particularly for nursing home care, the state can eventually recover those costs from the estate. Federal law bars that recovery during your lifetime. No lien can attach to the family home while you live there, and no recovery can happen until after you die. This protection applies regardless of the home’s value and does not require an application. It ends at your death, when the state can then pursue what remains.8Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 42 USC 1396p – Liens, Adjustments and Recoveries, and Transfers of Assets
Retirement Accounts and Life Insurance
Most retirement accounts and life insurance policies pass directly to the named beneficiary and skip probate. For employer-sponsored retirement plans covered by federal ERISA rules, including 401(k)s and pensions, you are the automatic beneficiary unless you previously signed a written waiver agreeing to a different one. Even if your spouse named someone else on the beneficiary form, the plan must pay you without that waiver.
IRAs are different. They are not covered by ERISA’s automatic spousal beneficiary rule, so whoever is named on the form receives the account. If you are the named beneficiary, you have an option no other beneficiary has: rolling the IRA into your own. Doing that lets you calculate required minimum distributions based on your age instead of your spouse’s, which can reduce the tax burden in the years right after the death.9Internal Revenue Service. Required Minimum Distributions for IRA Beneficiaries
Because these assets pass outside probate, they are not touched by the elective share or by intestacy. If you are the named beneficiary across the major accounts, you may inherit most of what your spouse had regardless of the will. If your name was removed from a beneficiary form before death, state probate law generally cannot get it back.
Social Security Survivor Benefits
If you were married for at least nine months before your spouse’s death, you may qualify for Social Security survivor benefits. There is a one-time lump-sum death payment of $255 that must be applied for promptly.10Social Security Administration. Lump-Sum Death Payment
The monthly benefit matters more. You can begin collecting reduced survivor benefits as early as age 60, or age 50 if you are disabled. Starting at that minimum age gives you about 71.5% of what your spouse was receiving or entitled to receive. Waiting increases the percentage, reaching 100% at your full retirement age, which is between 66 and 67 depending on your birth year.11Social Security Administration. What You Could Get From Survivor Benefits
Remarrying before age 60 disqualifies you from these benefits. Remarrying at 60 or later does not. An ex-spouse who was married to your late spouse for at least 10 years may also qualify for survivor benefits on the same record.12Social Security Administration. Who Can Get Survivor Benefits
Taxes You Should Act On
Anything you inherit from your spouse qualifies for the marital deduction under both federal and Connecticut law, so it is not taxed at the first death. The tax questions come later, when you die with a combined estate, or when you sell inherited assets.
Connecticut’s estate tax is a flat 12% on the amount exceeding the state exemption. For 2025 decedents, the exemption was $13.99 million, matched to the federal figure.13CT.gov. Estate and Gift Tax Information The federal exemption for 2026 is $15,000,000 per individual.14Internal Revenue Service. What’s New — Estate and Gift Tax
Portability lets you capture whatever portion of your spouse’s federal exemption went unused. If your spouse used only $3 million of a $15 million exemption, you can add the remaining $12 million to your own. To claim portability you must file IRS Form 706, even if the estate owes no federal tax. Under Revenue Procedure 2022-32, estates that were not otherwise required to file have up to five years from the date of death to make the election without seeking a private letter ruling.15Internal Revenue Service. Revenue Procedure 2022-32 Filing costs little and skipping it can cost millions later.
Inherited property also gets a step-up in basis. If your spouse bought stock for $50,000 and it was worth $400,000 at death, your basis becomes $400,000. Selling later at $410,000 means capital gains tax on $10,000, not on $360,000.16Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 USC 1014 – Basis of Property Acquired From a Decedent Connecticut is a common law state, so on jointly owned property only your spouse’s half receives the step-up. Your half keeps its original basis. This matters most for a home or investment account you bought together decades ago.
The Small Estate Shortcut
If your spouse’s solely owned personal property totals $40,000 or less and they owned no real property in their own name alone, you can use Connecticut’s small estate procedure instead of formal probate. You have first priority to file a small estate affidavit with the probate court. The filing lists the estate’s assets, creditors, and beneficiaries, and requires a certified death certificate.17Connecticut General Assembly. Chapter 802b – Decedents’ Estates
The $40,000 threshold does not count jointly held accounts, payable-on-death accounts, or beneficiary-designated assets. An estate that looks larger than $40,000 at first often qualifies once those are excluded.
What You Have to File, and When
Most of these protections are not automatic. You have to ask for them. The elective share must be filed within 150 days after the administrator is appointed or 60 days after the will is admitted, whichever is later. The family allowance and continued homestead occupancy require a request to the probate court. Portability requires filing IRS Form 706. Small estate treatment requires an affidavit. If you believe the will is invalid due to fraud, undue influence, or improper execution, you can contest it in probate court, though contests are slow and expensive.18Justia. Connecticut Code Title 45a-250 – Appeals From Orders, Decrees, and Denials of Probate Courts
Getting a probate attorney involved early is the single best way to avoid missing a deadline that cannot be reopened.